


Venus’s No Good, Extremely Bad, Very Odd Year

by snap_snap_snap



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Humor, Not Beta Read, Not Canon Compliant, POV First Person, Science, Science Fiction, Slow Burn, Spoilers, Witchcraft, just for the OFC tho
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:33:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 19,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27427987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snap_snap_snap/pseuds/snap_snap_snap
Summary: "Once upon a time, there was a girl in college. Not very unique, all things considered: a bio major at a STEM school, divorced parents, general mental health issues. Y’know, the usual things. And this girl was well aware of her average life experience until the day everything became very un-average.But, well, you expected that, right? You wanted something strange and unusual and romantic to happen. That’s why you’re reading this story.But our heroine sure as shit didn’t expect the floor to fall out from under her on her way to class, 10 AM on a goddamn Monday in mid-November."AKA, Basically an isekai fic for someone going from our timeline to the MCU timeline. Extremely self-indulgent OFC insert.Please note that this is all unedited and messy, and at any time I may pull shit down to fix stuff. E for language, future mental health/abuse mentions, and future gore/sex.
Relationships: Eventually - Relationship, Loki (Marvel) & Original Female Character(s), Loki (Marvel)/Original Character(s), Loki (Marvel)/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 32
Kudos: 82





	1. You Have to Start Thinking with Portals

I’m late. Fuck, shit, I’m so goddamn late!

It’s 9:55, class starts at 10:10, and Professor Morgan counts attendance. Fuck intro to computer science.

I roll ass-over-backwards out of bed and hit the floor running. Water boiling for instant while brushing teeth, get dressed while shoving a poptart in my mouth, all of the lovely sensations associated with a late start; and then I’m out the door, dorm room slamming locked behind me. 

I hit the sidewalk outside with about three minutes to get from the dorms to the heart of campus, so needless to say, I’m jogging, holding my tits while my backpack tries to collapse my lungs with its hoard of notebooks. Everything is fine, everything is good, I’ll be late but I can borrow the first few lines of notes, and then – I’m falling?

Well, that’s fun.

So, I start screaming.

Trees and asphalt melt into a kaleidoscope of colors, textures, smells, sensations, like a bad acid trip hit at 10x speed. Blue, red, and orange neon hues flash in my peripherals while grayscale spirals splash like oil over my sightline. Desaturated smells and sounds like muffled death metal roll over me in waves, each blinding combination becoming the next before I can blink. I think I’m going to vomit, it’s all so much, like I’m seasick and sleep paralyzed and hyper-focusing all at once, and—

And I’m out. I’m out, and I’m still screaming, but the ground is solid again and the noise is gone and I can think again, but then someone’s touching my back, and I roll back and launch backwards and land hard against a wall.

“Woah, hey!” a voice cuts into my renewed panic. I look up, and as my world finally completely stops spinning, I realize I’m not alone. Like, very not alone. Like, there’s at least thirty people in this room with me. “Are you done screaming now?” I find the source of the voice and nod twice. “Okay, good. Now, who the fuck are you and how are you here?”

I look around again, and boy did I miss something. About half of said bystanders are all pointing some kind of gun at me. I look at the talking guy again and sort of shrug. “I fell?”


	2. The Other End of the Spectrum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This takes place during the 2012 movie, and there's gonna be some general timeline messiness later, but please note that this does reference stuff from later movies.

This had to be a trick, right? It had to be. They were prepping for a war and some kid pops onto the Helicarrier out of nowhere, just screaming her damn head off. This was either a trap of a really bad joke.

Tony jumped the console dividing him and ten SHEILD agents from the kid and kneeled down to meet her eye level. “You fell.” It wasn’t a question, but she damn sure responded like it was.

“Uh, yeah, uh, I had class, and I was running to it, and the concrete, like, stopped working?”

“Breathe, kid. Concrete stopped working?”

“Yeah! And then everything smelled, like, a lot, and it was super bright, and—” Tony saw Steve start to walk up and held up a hand to hold him back, and his other hand held up the blaster he’d prepped when he’d first heard screaming from the lab a story up.

“I would say nice try, but it really wasn’t one. Maybe get a better cover story next time. So, you working for Loki? Or some other lunatic we haven’t heard of yet?” And here is where Tony expected things to get violent. He’d seen it before, he’d see it again. Some criminal gets caught with their pants down and tries to lie their way out, then blow up when they realize that Plan A isn’t working. But, instead of pulling a gun from somewhere or morphing into a Loki duplicate, the girl just sat there and started…crying? 

When the big tears started rolling down her cheeks, Steve opted to go full Captain Dad mode. “Tony, calm down. It’s weird, sure, but she’s hardly acting like some kind of assassin. With everything that’s been happening, a teenager appearing out of nowhere wouldn’t be the strangest thing we’ve seen,” he said.

Tony rolled his eyes. “Yes, we know, you’re America’s sweetheart for a reason. But don’t forget, we’re preparing for a war, and we have a sociopath in a glass tube, and—”

“Wait, uh, hold up, please,” the girl spoke up. 

“It’s rude to interrupt, but I’ll allow it, for now,” Tony said, bracing his weaponed arm on his knee.

“Two things. One, I’m not a teenager, I’m twenty one. Two, I may sound crazy, but let me guess something,” she said, picking up her arm and pointing to figure after figure in the room, starting with Tony. “You’re Tony Stark, aka Iron man,” she moved over to Steve, “You’re Steve Rogers, aka Captain America,” and down the line she went. “And Black Widow-slash-Natasha Romanov, Director Nick Fury, Agent Coulson, Doctor Banner—”

“If you’re trying to convince us you’re not a threat, you’re not doing a good job,” Fury cut in.

The girl shook her head back and forth, throwing her hair wildly before she reached up to smooth it back down. “No, no, I know, I mean. I don’t know how to say this. But, like, I’ve already seen this movie?”

“Excuse me, what?”

***

I stared dumbly at, hmm, could I call them the Avengers yet? Like, were they going by that at this point?

“I mean, you’re a movie, where I’m from. Based on comic books, by Stan Lee. You don’t exactly look identical to the actors I’m used to, but,” I shifted my head back along the wall to take in the scene again, “Yeah, this all looks about right.”

“What do you mean, where you’re from?” Steve asked. Can I call him Steve? That seems too informal. Mr. Rogers. Mr. Captain. Something, not just Steve.

“I can’t be from here, so to speak, right? I mean, unless this is all a hallucination because I finally had a mental breakdown. That has to be it. Yeah, okay, I’m hallucinating, and you’re all orderlies at the mental hospital,” I began nodding to myself, trying to convince myself that the corrugated metal under my butt was fake, the air pressure popping my eardrums was fake, the Iron Man style palm-gun-thingy pointed at my head was fake. Because this couldn’t be happening. Life isn’t a bad fanfiction; you don’t get to quit college and hang out with super heroes. Nothing in life was that easy.

I didn’t notice I was pinching my arm to the point of bruising until Tony, no, Mr. Stark yanked my hand off myself. “Stop doing that. You may be certifiable, but I’m sure as hell no one’s imaginary friend,” he said. He threw his head back over his shoulder and pushed up his glasses with his free hand. “Banner, take her back to your lab for now. Slap some cuffs on her, check her out, see if she has brain damage or if she’s an alien spy. Oh, please and thank you.” I couldn’t see the cheeky grin but I could image it was probably present due to Banner’s reaction. 

Before I could blink, some random lady with the SHEILD insignia was putting my wrists in said cuffs. “Ooh, kinky,” I said. I could lie and say it was on accident, but it’s my mental breakdown and I can be horny if I want to. At least, Stark seemed to find it kind of funny, or he was half-laughing because he, uh, I don’t know. What makes hallucinations half-laugh? My suffering?

The non-essential NPCs went back to doing whatever, and I got led up to the lab. It really did look like in the movie. Fancy clear screens, lots of white machinery, all very sci-fi. I must be wasting so many brain cells on this. I got deposited by a small table and a third cuff coming off my pair latched onto a sturdy bracket on the wall, but I still had enough slack to sit comfortably. One or two of the regular shield people stayed in the lab, as well as Banner and ah, nope, everyone else left.

“Assuming I’m not in a coma, and that actions have consequences, the other Avengers are off deciding my fate, right?”

Banner let out a small laugh, but it sounded almost bitter. “Yeah, they tend to do that. And making decisions is about the only thing that could pull Tony away from poking and prodding at you himself.”

“You’re going to be okay, by the way.”

“Pardon me, what?”

“You’ll be okay. You and the Hulk. You work it out. It takes forever, but it does happen, and in the end, I think you’re pretty happy.” Banner walked over to me with a syringe in hand and an odd expression on his face. “Sorry, I bet that’s weird to hear. It’s just, you were always so sad in this movie, and the whole Hulk deal is such a weird hot mess anyway. Yeah, sorry, I’ll shut up now.” I could feel my face flushing as I leaned my head back against this new metal wall and held out my arm so he could take my blood.

“You don’t have to apologize. Yes, it’s odd to hear such a vague and casual prediction of my future, but at least it’s good news. Just, maybe don’t drop this kind of announcement on the others,” he said. I felt the prick as the needle went in and resolutely didn’t look; my stomach was unsettled enough as it was.

“I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks.” I did watch the needle come out. Banner took it over to another machine, spread some blood on a slide, capped the tube, and put the slide into the white box thingy. “What’s that? Like a mass spec?”

“Something like that, but good use of terminology. You said you’re in college, right? Are you a science major?”

“Yessir. Formerly biochem, now just bio.”

“Good to know.” The machine beeped and he glanced at the readout screen. “Well, that’s interesting.” I moved to get up and check out the results, but got rudely reminded by the chain that I was still in handcuffs. Banner motioned for me to sit back down. “Mainly, it just confirms you’re human. The interesting part is your isotope readout.”

“Interesting how?” I asked, warily. I know isotopes are common an yada yada science, but isotopes often mean radiation which can often mean cancer, so excuse me for being a bit paranoid.

“Well, hmm, how should I explain this,” he said. Banner leaned bac against the counter and began cleaning his glasses on the edge of his shirt. “You said you’re from somewhere else, yes?” I nodded. “And where you’re from, did you have a world war two?” I, again, nodded. “And the bombs dropped?”

“Fat man and little boy, yep.”

“Exactly. Well, those bombs going off left a certain amount of specific isotopes essentially world wide due to the nuclear fallout. It’s a distinct isotope signature found is everything post the bomb drop, and absent from anything beforehand. You have a similar isotope signature in your blood, but it’s not quite the same. It’s shifted. It doesn’t prove anything, but it goes along with the idea that you’re from somewhere distinctly different from this reality.” His head dipped down and he typed out something quickly. Not a minute later, To—Mr. Stark was walking back through the door. With a wave, one of the SHEILD randos came and unlocked my hands.

I looked up from my slightly-reddened wrists to see Stark holding his hand out to me. I grabbed it, and damn did that man have a firm handshake. 

“Banner seems to believe you, that you’re here because of some trans-dimensional mistake and not here to kill anyone. So, for now, welcome to SHIELD, kid. What’s your name?”

“Uhh. Venus.”

“That’s fake, isn’t it?”

“Yep.”

“Gonne tell me the real one?”

“For now? No. After, uh, some things maybe happen, probably.” Hydra infiltrators ain’t gettin’ my info, not if I can help it. Fucking nazis.

“Things?” Dammit, I just got him to like me, and now he was glaring at me again. “What things?”

I opened my mouth to respond when a flash of light off to my left caught my eye. Glancing over, I saw a characteristic gold spiral-circle thing, and a pale arm reaching over and grabbing mine. “Tilda Swinton? Oh shit—”

And I was going through a portal again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment with suggestions pwease :> im baby


	3. Aw Shucks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> note: chapter was changed and updated 11/18

“Who do you think you are?”

I blinked. Not exactly the reception I was expecting, but I suppose it’s not unwarranted. “I’m, uh, Ven—”

“No. Allow me to rephrase. Who do you think you are that _gives you the authority to shatter the integrity of this timeline_?” For someone I was used to seeing all calm and serene on screen, an angry Ancient One was a terrifying sight. She was practically seething, and I scrunched myself smaller, back against another wall (stone, not metal, this time, so that’s a fun change).

“Oh. That.”

“Is that all you have to say for yourself?”

“Well, I didn’t mean to!” I huffed. “I wasn’t intending to fall through a hellportal and end up fucking up everything! I was trying to go to class!” The more I thought about it, the more it made my blood boil. “And, actually, who the fuck are _you_ to accuse me? I know literally nothing! I have had no agency in the effects of today, I have simply been the unlucky clown who gets fucked up at the circus! My ass was shot out of a time cannon, I had guns pointed at me, and, and now I’m defending myself to like a demi-god lady! I didn’t sign up for any of this!” I said, hands moving more and more as I got into my rant. What the fuck! What the fuck! I don’t even know how to be excited right now, because every move I make is out of one frying pan and into another goddamn bonfire!

The Ancient One made a motion with her hands for me to stop, and I paused my rant to breathe again and meet her eyes. “I suppose that was unfair of me,” she said, tension bleeding from her shoulders as she took a deep breath and sighed. “Come, sit down. Would you like some tea?”

I nodded and plopped down on one of the comfy-looking pillow sat around a low table. A look around the room showed me we were in some kind of stone gazebo, outfitted with a low wooden table. The area surrounding the gazebo was mostly just trees on one side, and the other side showed a structure that looks like the school from the Dr. Strange movie. “Yea—uh, yes ma’am, that would be nice.”

The formality got a half-smile reaction. “I suppose I can be at least thankful that you have decent manners.”

“Of course I do. I’m southern. It’s like, be polite or get glared at by everyone in a three mile radius,” I said. My fingers picked at a loose thread on my pillow-seat until a warm cup of tea was placed in front of me. “Thank you.” I wasn’t paying attention, but there hadn’t been a teapot here earlier, so I’m assuming more gold-circle magic was used.

“You’re welcome. Now, you said you hadn’t intended to move transdimensionally?”

“No! Nope. Not at all. Uh, by the way, what’s the date?”

She looked only mildly surprised by the question. “May 10th, 2012 of the common era. What was the date in your dimension?”

“November 3rd, 2021.”

“Oh. Hmm,” she narrowed her eyes at me and sort of focused really hard on me for a second. “You don’t seem to be lying, but I’d rather be sure. Perhaps…Perhaps this will help.” Without another word, she stood and circled the table to stand in front of me. I moved to stand up, but before I could, her palm pressed against my forehead—

You’d think I’d get used to all this magic bullshit by now. But no. As I began to float around, my astral form severed from my physical body, I grabbed my head (which is hard when everything is intangible) and started to flip out all over again.

“Please, stand still,” the Ancient One said, because she was in her astral form too, just standing cool as a damn cucumber in front of me.

“Give me warning! Please! That was so scary!” I said. It’s kinda hard to freak out or calm down when you kinda don’t have lungs. On the plus side, a panic attack was nigh impossible, but I was mentally left on a weird cliff between acting normal and screaming. Toeing the line between those two options, I dropped my arms, and let the Ancient One go about examining me.

“If all goes to plan, you should never have to experience this again,” she said. She carefully walked around my astral form and I did my best to not stare at my own body. I felt anther push, a palm between my shoulder blades, and when I blinked I had lungs again.

“Bahhhhhhh,” I heaved, “God, that’s so weird, why, okay, why, did that have a point?”

“Of course it had a point.” She circled back around the table and sat down again, ignoring me lying face-flat on said table to enjoy the sensation of having a body again. “Suffice to say, I can tell a great many things from a person’s soul. And yours tells me you are certainly not from this plane of existence.” That made me perk up.

“Oh, okay, so you believe me?”

“Yes, I do.” She stood up and motioned for me to follow. Just in case she threw me out of my body again, I got up quick, and warily watched as she walked towards the gazebo entrance. “Follow me.”

I fell in line behind her and craned my neck to check the place out. Fuck. What was it called again? Would it be rude to ask? “Um, I’m sorry, but what’s this place called again?”

“Kamar-Taj.”

I nodded in responce, and generally lost track of where we were walking because _damn_ this place is gorgeous (like, so many trees, and it’s kinda warm but a decent temperature, and everything smells like flowers), so I jumped a little when she stopped and I nearly ran into her. “Oh! I recognize this, uh, library place!”

The Ancient One began poking around different bookcases. “That was going to be my next line of questioning. How exactly do you know the future of our world?”

“Back home, it’s a movie series. That’s why I thought you were Tilda Swinton, for a second. She’d the actress who plays you,” I said. This sure is a weird fucking discussion.

“And where does your knowledge of our future end?”

“Endgame is the last major movie—wait, no, Far From Home was the last movie I watched. The highlights are that Thanos comes to visit, gets all the infinity stones, kills half of everyone, then the remaining Avengers do some nonsense physics to get the stones and resurrect everyone. Then there’s a big battle and Tony dies, and Steve super-ages, and Thor faces depression. It’s, it’s a lot,” I said. I found another wall (this time a wooden one! How innovative) to lean back against. The Ancient One nodded along and continued to look through different shelves, occasionally pulling books out part-way before pushing them back into place. “What are you looking for?”

“A specific spellbook that should allow me to send you back.”

The phrase made my blood not freeze, but definitely get uncomfortably cooler. “Oh.” I slumped back further.

She turned to face me and her expression shifted into something puzzled. “You sound disappointed.”

I shrugged. “I mean, yes? Kinda?”

“Don’t you want to go home?” I shrugged again. She stared me down, and I got the point: continue, don’t be an ass.

“Sorry. Okay, yes, intellectually, I know going home would be my safest bet. I’ve missed my lecture by a longshot, but everything else will probably be back to normal, and we can all get along like nothing happened.” I rolled my neck and pushed my shoulder blades against the wall as I considered how to best phrase the next part of my little speech. “It’s just cool. To see all of this. Like, back home, there’s no magic. No mystic arts. No sci-fi billionaires with a knack for saving the world. It’s just one disaster after another, and politician after politician trying to kill half the population. I know this place isn’t perfect, but sometimes it feels like y’all have a better chance for long term survive than my world does. So, it’s kinda relaxing, here. No man-baby dictators, no global environmental crisis, just evil aliens and the looming possibility of intergalactic genocide. Maybe relaxing wasn’t the right word,” I explained. The Ancient One generally seemed to get my point, though; she half-nodded along, then went back to checking out books.

“I can empathize with your situation, to a degree, but you staying here will only become exponentially more dangerous. The fabric of the universe does not like to be meddled with, and the consequences of your unintended trip may be more dire than either of us realize,” she said. She pulled out a small pile of books and set them down, gold magic glowing as she used it to rapidly flip through pages.

The conversation died after that, and I spend my presumed last half-hour in the MCU watching leaves fall off of a tree outside. It was really beautiful. Maybe I could visit Tibet back home, one day, when everything wasn’t under constant threat of death and political turmoil. Well, okay, maybe I could have grandkids that one day visit Tibet. Yeah, that felt feasible.

A time all too short later, the Ancient One made a satisfied noise. “You called yourself Venus, yes?”

“Yes, ma’am. Did you find the spell?”

“I did indeed. Please, come sit. This will be easier if you are relaxed.”

I nodded and did as she told me to, moving to sit across from her in a wooden chair. It creaked when I sat down, but it wasn’t too uncomfy, despite its aged nature. With me in position, the Ancient One started doing magic stuff, gold light coming from her hand motions and she said some stuff I didn’t understand. It was a bit somber for me, but I couldn’t help but appreciate the spell. It was intricate, like a carving made out of blown glass and fire. A golden and gorgeous tattoo on the wind, doomed to die for the sake of my travel. Her words grew to a crescendo and I closed my eyes; it hurt coming in, so it would probably hurt going back. I tensed up and waited for the air to collapse in around me, to blink and be back in the hellportal, and a beat passed. Then another beat. And another.

When I opened my eyes, I was still sat in the library, and Tilda Swinton was glaring at me again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comment with any suggestions to make the story better! i'm going off pure memory for some of the characterization here so hopefully is ain't too fucked up.


	4. Oops I Did It Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> note: chapter revised and totally changed and reuploaded 11/18

“So the spell…didn’t work?”

“You lied to me—”

“What? No—”

“Enough!” she boomed, her voice reverberating off of the library walls. “I do not know how you managed to trick me, but you did, and you shall pay the price.” As she spoke, the Ancient One drew back her hand, and a fan of gold light formed, primed to strike.

“Wait, no, no, I didn’t lie—”

“Have you no dignity? Will you keep up the charade until your final breath?” Her eyes were hard and her tone jagged, rougher than the edge of a hunting knife. Whatever she saw when she did the spell, it wasn’t pretty, but fuck me if I’m gonna pay the price for it.

“I’m not lying! I didn’t lie! I said I don’t know what’s going on, and I still don’t!” I said. I put every ounce of sincerity as I had in my body into my words, and the Ancient One’s posture relaxed, just a little bit. “Please, just, tell me what happened, I’m flying blind here. Please—”

I didn’t get the chance to finish as, at that moment, a hole got blown into the library ceiling. Debris showered overhead and bookshelves shook over from the force. I braced my hands over my head, and when I blinked away the dust from my eyelashes, I saw a familiar blue light pointed right at me.

“Uh, Mr. Stark?”

“Can it. I would shoot you here, but Fury wants to know how you got on the carrier. So, up. You’ve earned yourself a spot in a cell,” he said. His eyes glanced away from mine and I watched as he pointed his right hand-gun-thingy at, presumably, the Ancient One, who was behind me at this point. “You too, baldy. Come peacefully and you won’t get roughed up too much—”

A gold light shot through my line of sight and hit the center of Tony’s right palm-gun. The light faded out, and I had to suppress a snort at Tony’s annoyed expression. “Anthony Stark. I had hoped to avoid you and your ilk for a bit longer.”

“ _Ilk_? Excuse me? Who the fuck do you think you are—” He shifted his other palm-gun to the Ancient One, and I took the opportunity to skooch backwards under a table.

“I am the Ancient One, Sorceress Supreme of Earth. And I believe, in this instance, we are not enemies,” she said. I craned me neck to see where she was, then flinched as a line of gold wrapped itself around my throat, dragging me out from under the table. As I fought to get my fingers under the rope so I could fucking _breathe_ , she just kept on talking, “You are here for her, yes?”

“Yeah. I want her alive, though, if you please,” Tony said. He still had his palm-gun trained on her, from what I could tell, all choking on the floor and all.

“I also have questions for her, and I am more well-prepared to contain her here than you are on your…?”

“Quinjet. And nice try, but no, I’ll be taking her, and leaving.”

“No, you will not,” her voice boomed. It must have been loud, because I could hear her over the blood rushing to my head. I kept on struggling, and just as I got a finger wedged just enough to let me breathe a full breath, I felt a hand touch my head, and everything went black.

***

[An Hour Earlier] 

“I told you!”

“Calm down, Tony.”

“No, _you_ calm down. I told you she was dangerous—”

“It wasn’t like we didn’t agree with you, Stark,” Natasha said, tone flat despite her exasperated body language. “Besides, uncuffing her was your idea. Let her off the leash and see what she did, or something. And what she did was escape.”

Tony let out a grunt of frustration. It was true, it had been his idea to uncuff her, but he hadn’t expected her to disappear through a damn _portal_. Maybe he should have listened a little closer to her story when the kid first dropped out of the sky.

“Okay, fine, I take responsibility for that. Just let it be known: I was right, the girl was a plant, yada yada,” he said. He aimed his ire at Fury. “I thought you said this ship was supposed to be magic-proof.”

“And normally, it _is_ ,” he said. The scowl was practically an accent at this point with how much it affected his speech pattern. “The girl must have done something to the shields when she first showed up.”

“Shield has faulty shields, huh?” Tony said. He walked over to one of the machines in the room, one he’d brought from home. “Okay, so, what I did was technically illegal, but only for a human. So, I’m claiming immunity for this next bit,” he said. He saw Banner open his mouth to say something, but Tony moved too fast, and the machine opened up to show a 3D hologram of the globe and a blinking red dot somewhere in Asia.

“What the fuck is this?” Fury asked, standing next to Tony to focus his one good eye on the red dot.

“I—”

“You put a _tracker in her_?” Banner said. Clearly, he wasn’t pleased as punch about the idea. Too bad.

“Yes, if you would let me finish,” he said with an eye-roll. “Long story short, when I shook her hand, I shot a small GPS tracker into the skin beneath her palm. She didn’t even feel it, so it’s fine, and now we can find the brat.”

Fury ran a hand down his face. “Stark, if we didn’t need your brain, I would shoot it.”

“Thanks, boss.”

***

When I woke up, I wasn’t being choked anymore, but I was wrapped in that gold thread stuff. And tied to a chair. Lovely.

“What the fuuuuu—”

“Ah, she’s awake,” a deep, crackly voice cut off my lament. How rude.

I opened my eyes and the scene was, well, grim. For me. Romanov, the Ancient One, and Stark were stood around me like a firing squad. Tony was holding some kind of fancy walkie-talkie, and I assumed it was Fury on the other end, hence the lo-fi wakeup call. “Well, I’m glad I was invited to the party,” I mumbled.

“Bad time to be funny, kid. Madame Supreme here,” he nodded his head to the Ancient One, “explained that you’re a liar, and a damn good one. You’ve got five minutes to make a case for us not flat out torturing you-slash-letting our host dispose of you how she pleases,” he said. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck—

I squeezed my eyes shut and let my mouth ramble. “Okay, uh, um, I didn’t lie, but I don’t know how to make you believe me. I don’t know what happened when the Ancient One tried to send me back, and I really don’t see how I’m supposed to defend myself when I don’t even know what I’m accused of, like I don’t know much lawyer stuff but that seems wrong in the most basic sense, and—”

“Slow down. Your explanation won’t mean anything if we can’t understand a word of it,” a woman said, must’ve been Natasha because that was a new voice.

My eyes sprang open and I stared at the Ancient One. “Tell me what happened!”

My demand seemed to catch her off guard. Tony opened his mouth, but she held a hand up, and stared me down as she spoke. “When a being leaves a world through transdimentional travel, that being leaves a hole. A space where something or someone is missing. The spell was designed to find a hole that matches the missing being’s soul, and to send the being back to that place, completing the tapestry of that world once again. The spell failed because I could find no hole that you would fit in to,” she said. I sat in silence for a second. Okay, I, I could work with this. Maybe.

“Like, my home, where I came from, it’s…gone?” I asked. I really hoped that wasn’t the case, and her confusion about my question made me relax.

“No. There are many worlds which you could have fit in to, but none of them are missing anything. They are all complete,” she said.

I narrowed my eyes. “Did the spell just, like, fail then? Like in it’s goal. Because I came from a place and by your explanation that place should have a me-shaped hole—”

“Time’s up,” Fury announced through the phone-thing.

“Cuff her, kill her, or let her go,” Tony prompted, looking at the Ancient One. Evidently, she had the right of first refusal on my life or death. But the Ancient One didn’t respond right away. She just kept staring at me, and then suddenly turned and left the room.

The room sat in awkward silence for a second. Tony glanced at the phone-whatever, then shrugged, and pulled out a pair of nasty looking 4-bracelet cuffs. He took a step forwards, then promptly stepped back when the Ancient One came back through the doorway, carrying another book.

“If you would all please step back. I will need some space for this to work properly,” she said. The rest moved away, and I was left to stare at her while she prepped another spell. This one went much quicker, the symbols appearing out of nowhere and hovering above me. She said some stuff, did some hand motions, and suddenly all the symbols hanging mid-air converged on me like a swarm. I flinched as they hit my skin, each piece uncomfortably warm as they landed against my skin. They heated up, and I yelped, fighting my bonds to try and escape the skin-sizzling sensation as the symbols melted into my skin. Tears began to spring to my eyes and I thrashed, then all at once, the pain stopped. I slumped back and heaved in air and it took me another solid few seconds to notice the dying gold light coming from my skin.

“Why. Does today. Hurt. So much.” My chest was still heaving, and my skin felt like a three-day-old sunburn. When I pulled my head up to look at my lovely crowd again, they were all staring at the Ancient One, who was staring at me. “Did that fail too, or something?”

She shook her head and, which a flick of her wrist, my bonds dissolved. I gratefully stretched my arms, but when I met her eyes again, she looked… Just, she looked really sad. “I am so sorry, little one,” she said.

“Um, hello, wanna catch us up?” Tony chimed in.

She turned to look at him, then went back to looking at me like I was dying. Fuck. Was I dying? “She has been telling the truth, the part of it she understood. The rest is…rather tragic. Are you alright if I share this information with these people?” she asked. I shrugged.

“I mean, it’ll keep them from torturing me, right?” She sighed through her nose and nodded.

“I was not wrong when I said there is nowhere for you to return to. The best word to describe you is a duplicate, a clone. Your original self encountered some timeline anomaly, and it split her. You are the result,” she said. Ostensibly, that sounded like good news. That meant there was a version of me back home, going to class and talking to my friends and family and all, right? “The small mercy in this case is that your original self is fine. Barring other unforeseen circumstances, she will continue to live and exist as normal. But, the price of her existence’s stability is a certain lack of stability for yours,” she said.

Ahh. There’s the rub.

“So…I _am_ dying. Kind of?”

“Essentially, yes, but very slowly. Day by day the integrity of your soul will begin to fade, until you cease to exist.”

“Ah.” I slumped back in my chair and stared up at the ceiling. “How much time do I have before I, uh, poof?”

“…A year, at most.” I nodded, slowly. A year. Fuck.

Nodding to myself, I rose up out of my seat. The rest of my audience had gone quiet. I guess they could all empathize with having death sitting on your shoulders. I took a deep breath, and got to work.

“Tony.” He perked up, startled by the sudden direct address. “Steve’s best friend Bucky is alive, and Hydra Nazis have him mind-controlled, and he killed your parents while under the influence. By all intents and purposes, he really didn’t mean to, and if you get him out of the Hydra mind-prison thingy he’s really sorry about it.” While he reeled from that bombshell, I grabbed the phone from Tony’s hand. “You have a bunch of Hydra people inside SHEILD. You should, like, get rid of them. They’re gonna blow up both your main facilities and try to kill you like fifty times over. Also, protect Coulson, he’s gonna get himself shot in a bit.” I heard a faint curse come from the device, and guessed my point had been made. I handed Tony back the phone and turned to Natasha. “When you see Barton, hit him in the head. Really hard.” Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the Ancient One tensing up, and I wheeled on her. “Ma’am, I have one year left to exist. I’m sorry if this fucks things up long-term, but if I’m gonna die, some of these idiots may as well get to live,” I said. With everyone generally mentally off-balance from my little tirade, I left my would-be torture chamber.

Knowing you’re going to die certainly is freeing, if nothing else.

Time for more tea.


	5. Momento Mori

I got to sit and be alone with the shocking revelation of my impending doom for about five minutes, then I was accosted once again.

“Oh, hey Dr. Banner,” I said, glancing up at him from my position on the floor. I wandered until I wound up back at the stone gazebo, where my now-cold tea sat waiting for me, with a little pollen strand sitting in the water like a garnish.

“I understand if you want to be alone right now, but your, uh, information set off more red lights than green.”

“Then you’re here to interrogate me some more? When did you even get here?”

“Something like that, but a bit more polite,” he said. He sat down at the other side of the table, where the Ancient One’s empty teacup sat. “I was on the Quinjet while the others, uh, talked to you.”

“So, Hulk was the backup if I wound up being too dangerous?” Banner nodded, a bit reluctantly. At least he was honest. I tried to casually take a sip of my tea, but wound up spitting it back into the cup on reflex. I as casually as possible hocked the tea into the bushes behind me.

“Would you rather give the extra details to me, or my other warm and fuzzy coworkers?” That made me smile a bit. Yeah, I could work with this.

“What did I mention? Oh, yeah, Hydra and Bucky. That’s supposed to come up in a few years. Basically, Bucky Barnes didn’t die when Steve thought he did, and Hydra fucked with his head a bunch, and now he wears eyeliner and occasionally assassinated people for the Nazis. Rest of the time, he’s frozen and is in like cryo-sleep or something. One time, he got woken up to cause a car crash, which was the crash that killed Tony’s parents. Meanwhile, Hydra has been sneaking agents into SHIELD for years, and they want to take the whole organization down at once, which is why they wake up Bucky, and it’s all a hot mess. I don’t know how to fix these problems, these are just the details I remember,” I explained.

“Okay, do you have any other specifics?”

“I’ll be dead in 364 days. Is that specific enough?” I said, and Banner flinched back a bit. “Sorry,” I sighed, “Today has been a lot. On multiple levels. Also, your coworkers just threatened to torture and murder me, so forgive me for being on edge.”

He nodded, and I could tell he understood where I was coming from. “It’s alright. I’ll tell Fury you’re done for the day. He may not listen to me, but I’ll try.”

“Thank you.” He stood up to leave, “Uh, actually,” he stopped and looked back at me, “Do you know where I’m supposed to go from here? Wait, let me rephrase. I have no money, ID, or phone, or even my backpack. Am I freeloading with the Sourceress Supreme, or am I being carted back to the Helicarrier, or am I to run around Tibet and find a gutter to sleep in?”

He paused and considered my question for a second. “Where would you rather be?” he asked.

I shrugged. “Not in the gutter. Beyond that, here is cool, and pretty chill. The helicarrier is super cool but also, oh yeah, Loki is gonna attack the Helicarrier at some point.” I hadn’t meant that to sound so casual. Shit, fuck.

“I-I’m sorry, he’s what?”

“Yeah, uh, Barton is gonna show up, which is why I told Natasha how to fix him, and he’s gonna try and make you Hulk out to take out the carrier. That never completely works anyway, but Loki does get out, and that’s when Coulson gets shot, which may or may not kill him depending on—”

“Yeah, okay, I think Fury is going to drag you back with us whether you want to or not now. But, we need to go. Steve and Thor are babysitting Loki, but if the attack plan happens anytime soon, they’ll need help,” he said. He extended a hand and pulled me to my feet, and then we were fast-walking to presumably wherever the Quinjet was parked. Landed. Whatever, I’m tired. “And, remind me when we get back to my lab, Tony put a tracking chip in you. I’ll take it out.”

“That was a dick move,” I mumbled. I got in about two more steps before I tripped over myself, and after catching one more started expression from Banner, I passed out again. Exhaustion sure is fun.


	6. Enter the Brothers Odinson

Thor had missed the little mortal when she first arrived on Fury’s metal beastie, but he had planned to make a point of meeting her when he heard she’d been declared an ally. News of her interdimensional bungle traveled fast, and he felt he and other Asgardians may be the best suited to helping her find her way home.

He hadn’t expected to meet her while she was lying unconscious in a Quinjet, and he certainly hadn’t expected her second coming to be heralded by tidings of battle.

The Midguardians around him were all desperately preparing for some strike that would supposedly come along soon. Thor didn’t need much preparation beyond having his hammer in hand, and he had already aptly described Loki’s usual tricks to Fury, so he took over watch duty from Stark as the little one was transported to the medical wing.

“I assume you have a reason for setting a God on, what do you call it, babysitting duty?” he asked as Shield workers transported the girl from the metal bench to a stretcher.

“Sourceress lady broke one of my blaster, gotta go fix that, and if Loki tries to kill her, you’re her best bet as survival,” Tony said. Thor barely got a good look at the man before he disappeared into the crowd.

“Banner,” he stopped the man as he exited the jet, “Why aren’t you in charge of her safety? I didn’t take you as a man who enjoyed the thrill of battle.”

“I’m not, and apparently, Loki’s counting on that. He wants to make me Hulk out when it’s as inconvenient as possible for everyone else. Venus needs to be here for medical treatment, but I’m taking the jet back out to avoid the attack.” With that he, too, disappeared, back into the jet’s cockpit.

“I left the autopilot on for you,” the Widow called over her shoulder as she left. She clapped an arm on Thor’s back. “Don’t try and pass her off on me, either. I’ve got an operative to reboot.”

With all other options gone, Thor was left with two choices: go check on the little time traveler, and wait for the action to come to him, which would likely not happen and he would miss the battle entirely; or, disobey Fury, as he had every right to do as the God of Thunder, and go wait in the wings for the next stage of Loki’s plan to unfold…and leave the girl unprotected aside from the medical staff. With a deep sigh, Thor headed toward the medical wing.

***

Waking up in a new place is always distressing, but this awakening was at least more pleasant than the last.

I hurt, like, all over. My skin felt tight and a little tingly, my head was pounding, and even my bones were exhausted. I reluctantly opened my eyes, then shut them again to block out the harsh lighting above me. I heard footsteps, then the light dimmed, and someone gently tapped my arm.

“Can you tell me your name, please?” I didn’t recognize the voice.

“Uh, fuck. E—No, wait, Venus. Like the planet.”

“Okay, and open your eyes, please,” I opened them a little at a time to avoid blinding myself again, “Good. How many fingers am I holding up?”

“Three.”

That made the lady smile. She was wearing white, and I guessed she was some kind of medical person. “Alright, you don’t seem to have brain damage. We think you fell unconscious due to exhaustion, and we would allow you to rest, but we’re on yellow alert right now. In case of evacuation, you need to stay awake. Do you think you can do that for me?”

I nodded, and she smiled again. Pretty doctor lady is nice. “Uh. Where am I, though?”

“You are on a helicarrier, little one,” a voice boomed to my left. I awkwardly flung my head to the other side, and my eyes bugged out, which made Thor laugh. “I see my reputation precedes me!”

“I am so not used to seeing you without a beard.”

“Pardon me?”

I blinked a few times. “I said that out loud. Shit. Okay. Uh. Hi, God-man,” I stuttered out.

He looked above me and over to the doctor lady. “Are you sure her head is unharmed?”

I groaned and lifted my hands to cover my face. “I’m sorry if I don’t know the right procedure to meet a god-person-Asgard-whatever! It’s been a long day!” He laughed again, and I would swear that it made my bed shake a little.

“That is perfectly fine. If you are prepared, however, would you mind further explaining how Loki intends to attack us?” Oh, yeah, I did mention that.

I dropped my hands and, with the doctor’s help, sat up in the little hospital bed. “I forgot most of the specifics, but Loki wants Banner to go green, Barton is gonna attack the crew, and then he’ll try and trick you into getting into the glass cage thingy. Does that help at all?” Thor nodded.

“Yes, but I believe only your last statement is new information. How does he plan on tricking me into the cage?”

“He somehow opens the door, then looks like he’s in the doorway, and you jump him, but that version was like an illusion, and then you’re stuck in the cage.”

Thor huffed. “Well, now, that’s just old hat. You’d think he would have come up with a new trick to go with his evil masterplan.”

I shrugged. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” That made him stare at me a bit. “Yes?”

“’ _Ain’t_ ’?”

My reply was cut off by a deep rumbling. All three of us froze in place. And then…

Shit hit the fan.

***

Thor knew the attack had started as soon as he felt the helicarrier begin to shake. Within seconds, alarms sounded throughout the medical wing, and Venus’s doctor was ordering them to shelter in place while she went to check on other patients and prep for evacuation.

“We—Should, um, should we help?” Venus said. She was in no state to fight, but one look at her tired, honest face told Thor that she was genuine in her offer. She was a warrior at heart, then; he could respect that.

Thor pondered the question for a moment, but when he felt an explosion rock the ship, the choice became easy. “Yes. Can you stand, little one?” She nodded and rolled to the side of her infirmary bed. It took her longer than he would have liked, and her legs shook like a newborn colt, but stood she did indeed. “Good. Now, hold on to me tightly. We’re going to stop this at the source,” he said. She latched onto his arm, his other hand clutched Mjolnir, and off they set.

Most of Venus’s body weight was being supported by Thor’s right arm, but he barely noticed it between her tiny frame and the adrenaline in his veins. He knew it was likely he was walking into a trap, but he had the seer with him, and he believe that would more than tilt the odds into his favor. To her credit, Venus looked brave, although her hands shook where they clutched his arm. It was good she recognized the true danger of the situation, and he silently vowed to keep the little seer safe.

It took almost no time for them to find the glass cage that held his brother.

***

Just before we went into the room holding Loki’s cell, I tugged on Thor’s arm. He stopped and leaned down, which was both nice and annoying. “Yes, little seer?”

“I remembered something. Loki isn’t really secure in that cell. I think he gets out by just magicing himself out. Are you sure I should follow you in?”

Thor considered for a second, then kept moving forward. “It will be easiest for me to protect you when you are close to me, and when I can stare my enemy in the eyes. I know Loki’s tricks best tricks, and I won’t let him hurt you,” he said. That relieved me quite a bit, but I was still insanely worried. I was on the verge of collapse due to exhaustion and, while I would like to believe that Loki is ultimately more morally grey than straight-up black, I’m no idiot. This guy is planning on razing New York City to the ground, and he won’t mind doing the same to me.

Which begs the question: why did I agree to come here at all?

Ugh.

Before I could back out, we passed the threshold, and there in front of me was Loki.

Hands behind the back, leather armor, cocky smile Loki.

Fuck, no wonder I had a crush on this bastard when I was twelve.

“Ah, brother. Are you enjoying the show I—” he cut himself off when his eyes met mine, and I fought the urge to fully hide myself behind Thor. “What’s this? Have you brought me a sacrifice? Because that is certainly no soldier,” he sneered. I stuck out my tongue at him, and his temple twitched.

“She is no concern of yours, Loki. I have come to ask you again: _why_? Why are you doing this? Why are you attacking these people, who have done nothing to deserve your ire?” Thor asked. The genuine protective concern in his voice made me feel better about being here. As long as I stayed attached to his arm, I would be safe; I had to be. Then we blinked, and Loki was gone.

I latched harder onto Thor’s arms, and I tensed up straight as a rod, but nothing could have prepared me for the strength of the grip that appeared on my shoulder. I yelped and, in an instant, I was being held up by the throat, my toes fully off the ground. I scratched a Loki’s hand, but I was so tired, and I had already been chocked out once today. I could barely put up a fight, and I heard him laugh at my suffering. Bastard.

“Why?” He laughed again. “Dearest brother, _why not_? We are Gods to these people! Compared to them, we possess unlimited power! Why should they not worship at our feet, as their ancestors did?” Thor made a move to lunge at him, and out of nowhere, Loki had the scepter and pressed it against my chest. “Uh-uh-uh, be careful. We wouldn’t want your new favorite human to get _skewered_ ,” he said. For emphasis, I felt the pointed tip press harder against my sternum. Weakly, I kicked at him, but he only held my throat tighter. “Well,” he huffed, eyes darting between my turning-blue self and Thor, “This one certainly does have some fight in her. Perhaps I could use her for my own ends.” My vision started to go, black dots taking over my peripherals, but I felt the point on my chest start to heat up. Like before, words got harder to listen to over the sound of blood in my ears, but I distinctly heard Thor yell—

_Fuck, fuckfuck SHIT why does everything hurt so BAD—_

I could feel my throat tear as I let out a scream, and then I was falling to the ground, my chest heaving as I remembered how to breathe _again_. My head rolled back to see where Loki had gone, but he was still there in front of me, glaring down, and I could see his wrist was bleeding. Did I—

“How _dare_ you,” he hissed, and as he brought his leg back to kick me in the gut, Thor came charging at him.

“Loki! Stop it!” He tackled his brother full-body, and I could barely keep up with them, going head-to-head with scepter versus hammer. I rolled myself backwards on the metal floor and hid under a desk. My head was still swimming, and I could barely keep track of everything. I lifted my head to check on the battle and noticed Coulson out of the corner of my eye. I tried to motion to him to get away, but he couldn’t see me, and I knew where this was going.

I scooted out behind the desk and used it to pull myself up, then leaned over the edge. “Hey! Loki! Over here, you motherfucker!” That got his attention, if just barely, between Thor’s hammer blows. “They call me the little seer, you wanna know why? Because I know all about you! I know what you’ve done, what you’re planning. I know all of it!” I was getting louder and louder, and gradually Loki was shifting all his focus onto me. But I needed a kicker to distract him enough to change the story. “You’re going to kill only eighty people in New York, like the shittiest terrorist ever, and all of your plans are gonna fail. Then you’ll be arrested, and when you’re in another cell, your mom is gonna die! She’ll die, and it’ll be all your fau—”

“ _Quiet_!” he shouted, nearly spitting on me as he shoved the scepter to my throat. “You think you _know_ me? My plans? How could a _worthless_ mortal like you _ever_ —” He dodged a thrown Mjolnir and spun around to face me again, now smirking, and my blood went cold. “Little seer, hmm? Little _distraction_ ,” he hissed. Behind him, I saw Coulson raise the big gun-thingy, and Loki followed my eyes before I could look away.

“Goodbye, brother.” I felt a cold hand grab my arm, then a blue light flashed, and we were gone.


	7. Baby Come Back, You Can Blame It All on Me

“She did _what_ —"

“You _lost her_ —”

Stark and the Sorceress Supreme’s words clashed midair in a flurry of indignation.

“I don’t know!” Thor said, exasperated. He’d been trying to explain the fight with Loki for the past fifteen minutes, and between those two, he was having a hard time actually explaining himself. “I don’t know how she did it. Loki had her by the throat, and he pressed the scepter to her chest, and it sparked. Then, she just started _screaming_ so loudly, and then clawed at Loki’s wrist like she was some form of small dragoness. It was actually rather impressive, and painful enough that Loki dropped her—”

“And then you _lost_ her,” the Sorceress reiterated. “I left her with you all for less than two hours and you managed to lose her to a megalomaniac, yes?” Thor was not one to be easily intimidated, but her ire was one he decided he’d rather never provoke again.

“But, with the scepter, she stayed herself? Her eyes didn’t change?” Barton was an ally again, according to the Widow, and Thor was glad to shift his focus from the seething wizard.

“Clearly she stayed herself. I believe her little speech was some ill-conceived attempt to help me during the fight. She wouldn’t have attempted to help me if Loki owned her mind,” he said.

“And her rescue attempt is what led to her capture?” the Sorceress asked.

“If I may,” a voice came from the corner of the room. Coulson, the agent who seemed to fawn over the Captain, stepped forward. “I think she wasn’t only trying to save Thor. I think she may have also been trying to help, well, me,” he said, almost sheepish. And he should be ashamed! He was a full warrior, to be saved by an untrained maiden is an unthinkable slight!

“And why do you think that?” Stark cut back in.

Coulson hesitated, and the Sorceress took charge. “He was meant to die in that battle.”

“—I’m sorry, _what_?” the Captain said.

“Phil Coulson,” she continued, “is supposed to be mortally wounded and presumed dead at this point in time. Venus, by redirecting Loki’s wrath, inexorably altered his fate. This is what I warned you of before,” her stern look moved to Stark. “I told you her insight is more dangerous than any weapon. This is why I told you to keep her safe at any cost!” She was nearly seething again.

“I tried to! I left her with a god, for Christ’s sake—”

“A god who is the brother of her kidnapper,” she hissed. Stark clamped his mouth shut, and Thor almost winced when she turned back to him. “Loki was supposed to launch his attack from Stark’s tower, but his plans may now change. Where would he move his attack to?”

Ah, battle strategy. Thor could handle this. He thought for a moment, idly running his fingers along Mjolnir. Aha! “He would have chosen New York for two reasons: the high civilian population, and his ego. Tell me,” he turned to the Midguardians, “which other city is highly populated and considered a great source of power?”

Within a second, the Captain said, “Washington, D.C. Center of the American government. Lots of civilians and politicians, to boot.”

Thor nodded. “He will likely attack there, then.”

The Sorceress nodded and finally stopped looking like she wanted to impale him and feed him to Fenrir, piece by piece. “I would suggest, then, that you plan for attack in either location.”

She turned to leave, and Stark spoke up. “Wait, where are you going? Aren’t you going to help us?”

The Sorceress wheeled back around and glared sharply at him. “No, I am not. This is your mess to clean up, Stark. You promised me her safety, and I expect you to keep that promise. Additionally, her loose tongue may very well unravel the loom of fate altogether, and I must work to make sure that doesn’t happen.” She left no time to respond; a glowing ring generated beside her, and with a flash, she disappeared.

***

When they arrived at Stark’s tower, Loki dropped the girl, letting her fall into a heap on the floor.

This wasn’t how this was supposed to happen.

The helicarrier should have been taken down, his brother should have been immobilized, and the green beast should have been running rampant. Most of all, the power of the mind stone should have been _infallible_. And it seemed the cause of his dissatisfaction was this _little girl_.

He looked from the window to the ground and found her crawling backwards. At least she knew her proper place was on the ground. He reached her with two strides and easily picked her up by the throat, pinning her against the nearest wall. He pressed his scepter against her chest and smiled as she winced and tried to pull away.

“There’s no escape now, little witch. Now, tell me, what wisdom has your foresight given you, and how much did you share with those squabbling fools?” He paused to press the scepter harder against her chest, and the fabric of her blouse began to rip, giving him access to the flesh underneath. “Tell me willingly or I will overtake your mind—”

“Why,” the word was barely more than a wheeze, but she kept going, “Why didn’t you? Before?” Loki paused, then huffed a laugh. Did the little fool not know her own abilities? How fortuitous.

“Why waste the energy on a mind so _puny_?” he growled. “Tell me willingly, and perhaps I’ll spare the effort, and your life.” Her watched her eyes dart between the blade at her chest and his face. It put him at ease to see her act so helpless—

He choked on air and his eyes went wide when he felt the impact of hard rubber on his groin.

“Get _off_ ,” she yelped, and with a second wind of vigor, she followed up her attack on his nethers with a strike on his inner elbow. The blow made his grip loosen, just a bit, and she escaped enough to slide down the wall and make a retreat attempt from between his legs.

Loki heaved a breath, then let out a battle cry, whirling around to _find and skewer the impudent wench_ —

“Just, fuck, stop—” Was she begging for her life now? Too little, too late—

“Listen to me, you’re gonna die!” She hopped on the other side of Stark’s bar, like that would save her.

Loki stalked her like the prey animal she was; “Threats won’t help you—”

“It’s not a threat!” Her exasperation made him pause mid-step. “If things keep going like this, you are going to die! And so will Frigga!”

His mother’s name reignited his rage. How _dare_ she—

“No, I mean, I don’t want that to happen! I’m trying to help you, goddammit!”

Loki froze again. He wasn’t used to being the speechless one, but here he was, thrown at the witch’s proposition. She had to be lying…right?

***

By the time I got him to stop walking, my back was to the shelves, and he was at the stools. Fuck, okay, no time to waste.

“If you keep going down this path, Frigga gets attacked, and she dies, and then you get into a weird sex cult, and then Thanos kills you, okay? I know, it’s weird, but I really don’t want you to die—”

“Why?” he asked. The word was softer than I think either of us expected it to be. Anger had mostly dropped out of his expression, and now he just confused, and a little sad. Which tracks. I told him his mom was gonna die. A real joy of a bombshell.

“Why you die? Thanos is an asshole. Don’t work with him, he’s an OP idiot—”

“Why don’t you want me to die?” Oh.

“Uh. Long story. But, don’t try and choke me out again, and I’ll call us even?” I did the awkward white-person smile at him, but he still just generally looked confused.

“You’re lying,” he said, and he started working himself back up into a rage.

“Dammit, I’m not! Why is everyone and their mother calling me a liar today!” I yelped. I hoped up onto the bar as he started to mount it.

I tried to jump from there to escape again, but he grabbed me from behind, and I started thrashing around and wound up knocking us both onto the ground. He rolled me onto my back and pinned me down, and oh this would have been nice any other time, and I slammed up forehead up into his nose—“Ow!”—and started trashing around again. “Stop trying to kill me! Fuck! God! I got here like an hour ago! Take pity on me, I’m like a goddamn baby!”

He pressed me harder against the ground and growled above me. “Wench, you would feign frailty then stab me to impress your precious Avengers—”

“I literally just told you you’re my favorite, what the _fuck_ —”

“ _Favorite_?”

“Yes! Favorite! I think you’re cool, genocide aside! I think you’re hotter than Thor! Happy?!” I finally stopped moving for a second and just sort of stared up at him. Both of our chests were heaving, and un uneasy calm settled between us. Slowly, a drop of blood slid down his nose and dropped onto my forehead. “Uh. Sorry. About your nose. Can I get up now?”

He blinked slowly down at me then, surprisingly, sat up. Like, got off of me. I slid backwards and used my now-free arms to wipe the blood off my head. “So, does this mean you’ll listen to me now?”

“Why did the scepter fail to work on you?”

I tilted my head to the side. It failed? Oh, cool. “Well, my existence is kinda weird, so it’s probably something with that.” He stared at me for a second. “Okay, full explanation, all over again. I’m from a different reality! Where you’re an actor, and all of this is fake! And now I’m here, and I’m trying to help y’all not die, ideally. Oh, and I’m gonna die in a year, but that’s later me’s problem. Make sense?”

“Not particularly, no,” he said, standing and brushing the dust off his pants. He sighed and made eye contact with me, made a little gesture with his hand, then crossed his arms. “But, keep going. Tell me, how do you plan to save my life?”

I hopped back on the bar and sat down on it. “Keep the infinity stones you’ve grabbed, and never deal with Thanos again. And don’t attack New York. It fails anyway, and then you go to prison, and things go bad to worse, et cetera.”

“So, I live by giving up all my plans?”

“You live by not committing more murder. Generally doing the whole trickster thing is very cool, just like, less murder is preferable.”

He smiled, but the kind with no joy behind the eyes, and nodded slowly. “How do I know I can trust a word you’ve said to me?”

“Well, you haven’t killed me yet, so chances are you _want_ to believe I’m right.” He blanched a little, and I kept going before he could rage out again. “Why are you working with Thanos, anyway? He’s an idiot.”

“You’ve said that twice now. I believe I understand your opinion of him.”

“No! Really! He just wildly misunderstands population ecology!” I threw my hands up to emphasize my point. “Just take the infinity stones and run, man. Why do you even want to deal with Earth? It’s full of idiots, it’s more of a pain in the ass then it’s worth, really,” I said. That made his lips twitch up, like he was actually amused. Score.

“What a glowing recommendation of your own people,” he teased. He finally relaxed his stance a little and leaned against the wall across from me. “And what if I take your advice, hmm? What then?”

“You have a better shot at saving Frigga. You’ll have the power to fuck with Odin, who is a total dick by the way, you should ask him about your secret evil sister—”

“My _what_?”

“Yeah. He had a kid before Thor, but she turned out like super evil and wants to kill everyone now, and Odin just doesn’t tell anyone about. Her name is Hela,” I said. “But, really. Why work with Thanos? Why do you even want Earth?”

“I owe you no answers,” he spat. He started to tense up again, and I held up my hands in surrender.

“Fair enough.” I swung my legs a little and cracked my knuckles. “So…” He raised an eyebrow at me. “Was I convincing enough?”

He let out a deep sigh and relaxed again. At least I convinced him I’m not a threat. “Knowing that my benefactor will inevitably kill me for a job well done _is_ rather discouraging, forewarning of my mother’s doom and clandestine sister aside.” He met my eyes and smirked, and my hair stood on end. “I suppose Earth’s domination can wait. For now.” He blipped out of existence, and I started blinking rapidly, and then a voice came from next to my ear—“But you owe me a debt, witchling.”

I jumped off the bar and turned around, but Loki was already gone.


	8. Only Thor Can Pronounce My Lamp's Name

“Height?”

“Five-foot-one.”

“Weight?”

“One-forty-five.”

“Race?”

“Caucasian.”

“Allergies?”

“Penicillin.”

“You’re good to go,” the nurse said. I hopped off the guest bed and pushed my hair behind my ear as I walked back into the living room. I was still in Stark Tower, where Thor and Stark found me soon after Loki left. Dr. Selvig snapped out of the mind stone trance after Loki left Earth, and all the world-domination plans sort of died in the water at the same time.

“I’m all good,” I announced as I entered the room. I landed in the comfy chair I claimed as mine before the nurse showed up to check me over. The room also held all the original Avengers crew, sans Thor, who ran back to Asgard when I mentioned Hela to him. Oh, and Fury, Coulson, and Hill were there, albeit over a skype call thingy. I’m happy to say they were taking the Nazi issue seriously.

“I think that sorcerer lady is going to kill you over this,” Stark said. I just shrugged.

“I’m literally already dying. Check and mate.”

“That’s morbid,” Hill’s voice came through the screen. I turned and shrugged again in her direction.

“Anyways, infinity stones react weird to me, and Loki has two. Which y’all can call bad, but I did technically save 80 people, so I’m calling it a win,” I said.

“I’m just glad you gave him a good kick in the balls before he escaped,” Stark said. I snapped and made finger guns at him, and he rolled his eyes.

“Are y’all following up on the other stuff I told you about, too?” The SHIELD crew all nodded, which I already expected, and Stark and Captain Rogers shared a look. Oh, yeah, that was probably gonna be awkward. “I’m guessing Stark still wants to beat the shit out of Bucky, but I would ultimately recommend finding him first. Otherwise he won’t turn up until he kills T’Challa’s dad, which we should ideally avoid. Reminder, here, that Bucky didn’t intend to become a Hydra puppet,” I add, pointedly at Tony. Stark. Fuck. How formal do I need to be with these people?

“Who’s T’Challa?” Romanov asked from my left.

“Next king of Wakanda, played by the late great Chadwick Boseman in my world. Just—he’ll introduce himself later, probably, so don’t worry about it for now. Next main issue is Hydra.”

“Do you have any other details that would help with dealing with that problem?” Fury piped up.

“I’ve said about as much as I remember for now. If I think of anything else, uh. Hmm. I don’t have a phone or anything. Actually, I was wondering about that. How am I going to…exist, here, now?”

“What do you mean?” That was Banner, from my right.

“Like. I told you before, I don’t have anything here. No family, no SSN, nothing. I literally do not have a legal existence in this world, and also no money or phone or means to make a life for myself. Where do I go, now?” Explaining it like that, it’s all pretty fucking sad. I’m glad the original version of myself was back at home, with everyone I care about, but that left this version of myself even more desolate. I have nothing, I mean nothing to no one, and I’ll be dead in 360-something days. I zoned out for a second, and hard to start blinking back the beginning of some tears when someone—Stark—started talking again.

“Hey, kid, look at me.” He sighed. Why do I cause that reaction in so many people here? “For now, you’ll stay with me. You can stay in that room the nurse checked you out in. Okay?” His voice was softer now. I guess it was obvious that I was about to cry. Fuck. I nodded, and he continued. “I’ll get you set up with a phone and an expense card, and we can start getting you set up to live here.”

“We’ll take care of your papers. By the end of the week, you’ll be a bone-fide citizen,” Coulson said. I smiled as him in thanks, and he nodded.

***

[One Month Later]

Living in Stark Tower was strange, to say the least.

I saw Iron Man on the daily, who told me it was okay to call him Tony.

The Ancient One met with me, told me to be careful, and then left before telling me what “careful” meant.

Thor interviewed me about the infinity stones, and said he wanted me to talk to Odin, but Odin also kinda hates me because I told Loki about Hela. Apparently, I had already caused waves in Asgard without stepping foot in the place.

Fury found most of the Hydra agents within SHIELD, but no one had the info to find Bucky yet.

Bruce seems to like me, and he’s been giving me lab work to do while we wait for shit to hit the fan again. Tony may also like me, I’m not really sure. Like, I live with him, and I think Pepper likes me at least. But Tony flips between happily explaining quantum mechanics to me and barely acknowledging my existence. I think it’s probably because I defended the guy who killed his parents, but I can’t say I regret what I said.

Most of the other Avengers seem neutral to me. I think Rogers wants to like me, but the Bucky thing is kind of taking up all his brain space. Coulson acts like he owes me a life debt, which I guess he sorta does.

I don’t know if I should tell Barton that Thanos may kill his family.

But, on the up side, I had a closet again, and a full sock drawer to match. Tony also let me get some homey stuff, so I got some weird-patterned sheets online and spent a day in Ikea with him and Pepper. At least two people asked if they were my parents. It was weird. But I now own a Flaggskepp and a small pile of stuffed animals, so it was worth it.

I also had a laptop and a phone, which was good, and which I was making use of when my door got knocked on then immediately popped open.

“Rent-a-daughter,” ah, the other fun consequence of the Ikea trip: the new nickname, “mail for you on the counter. I smell a social security card.” Tony’s head appeared in my room, made his announcement, and disappeared again. I glanced at my nightstand clock. Meh, might as well have lunch and read see the legal documentation with my discord username on it. I forgot to tell everyone my real name in time, so now Venus just…is my name. My real name is now my middle name, my last name is mine but misspelled. Fun, fun, fun.

I popped out and headed into the communal living space on the floor just as, “Sir, Director Fury is calling on your priority line. Shall I put him through?” Jarvis kindly announced.

“Yeah, sure, put him up on the screen.” Fury’s ever-scowling face popped up on Tony’s clear iPad-looking thing. “Good morning, sunshine. What’s with the priority call?” I moved around on the other side of the island where Tony was sat. I pretended to check my mail because, yeah, I wanna know why Fury called, too.

“The tesseract showed up.” Tony and I both looked up and locked eyes. I skirted around the edge of the counter and joined Tony in whatever this Stark-tech-facetime call was.

“Where?”

“With Loki, or without?”

“Aegean sea, no Loki. Fisherman claims it nearly took out his boat, falling out of the sky like a damn blue asteroid. Our operatives already picked it up and it’s on the way to you all,” he explained.

“Like, here? The Tower?” I asked.

“Oh, she doesn’t know yet. We’ve got a new facility outside the city being set up—”

“Oh, okay, that place. I know what you’re talking about.” It’s fun that neither gets weirded out when I do that now.

“It’ll be on site within two hours. Gather whoever else you have in the building and head over, stat.” Fury hung up. Not much of niceties kinda person.

“Get ready, kid. You’re coming on this field trip,” Tony threw over his shoulder as he headed to the elevator. He was nose deep in someone in the iPad, and I was mildly impressed he didn’t run into a wall.

I changed from one pair of legging to another and called myself good to go. I didn’t really know what else to do to prepare. The past few weeks had been pretty calm, and it’s exciting for stuff to be happening again, but I was more tense than anything else. How did Loki lose the tesseract? Did he die? Is Endgame gonna start tomorrow?

“You in there?” I blinked as Tony snapped his fingers in front of my face. “I don’t know what’s got you so interested in that wall, but we have to go. C’mon,” he said. I snapped out of my fugue state and followed him down the elevator and into one of too-fancy cars. I moved to sit in the back and he gave me a look. “What are you doing?”

“Oh. Uh. Usually Ms. Potts sits up front with you.”

“Call her Pepper. And she isn’t here, and I’m not your chauffer.” I shrugged and moved up front, he got in, and poof. We were off.


	9. Cube (TM)

“Can I drive it on the way home?”

“No. Why do you even want to? New York traffic is awful,” Tony countered. We both stared ahead and met each other’s eyes in the reflection of the elevator doors.

“Fair. But I miss driving. And you drive a Jag! Please? Pretty please?” He glared at me through the reflection. “I could pull out the ‘I’m dying’ card, y’know,” I said. Tony rolled his eyes and grunted under his breath.

“Fine, but only until we hit the city limits—”

“ _Fuck_ yes,” I hissed, spinning in place on my heels. When I came back forward, the elevator doors were open, Fury was in front of us. He glanced at me, somewhere between his neutral look and faint amusement, then looked back at Tony.

“You brought her?”

“You said Tesseract, and time-space bullshit is her forte, so yeah. I brought the kid. Is it here yet?” Fury nodded and started walking, and I took the cue to follow.

“Banner is already set up with it in the lab. Last we talked, you said there was something inside of it?” He glanced back at me.

“Yeah. The cube part is like a little house, and the space stones lives inside it.”

“And the space stone is an infinity stone?”

“Yep! Uh, did I explain those yet?”

“Thor did. Odin had a lot to say on the matter, apparently. Has he called you up for a conference yet?” I shook my head. “Good. I get the feeling that he doesn’t like you.”

Okay, not unexpected, but also not fun to have that confirmation. So much for Asgard sight-seeing.

The lab at the facility looked about how most Avengers labs look in the movies: overly-high tech and extremely shiny. Lots of see-through screens, too. And a Keurig, which was unexpected, but not an unpleasant surprise. I waved and smiled at Bruce then started poking through the cups available.

Over my shoulder, the adults kept talking business, and I listened in while perusing.

“…I mean, it’s the same Tesseract as the one that left with Loki a month ago, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“Yes, doc, but did he _do_ anything with it?”

“Not that I can tell, Tony, but you’re free to check it out for yourself.”

“If it hasn’t lost its power, why did Loki let it go?” Fury’s question was my main concern, too. Why _did_ Loki ditch an infinity stone? Especially the one that’s his main source of transportation?

I popped a cup into the machine and set the paper coffee cup in the dispenser, then walked over to join the others. “Any verdict on what’s going on?” Bruce shook his head.

“So far, we’ve come up empty. Is there anything you think we should try?”

“I mean. I can poke it. We can see what that does.” Tony shrugged and motioned me towards the glow-cube. Fury opened his mouth, probably to tell me no, so I reached out and touched it before he could say anyth—

The room exploded in a cloud of plasmatic blue. Shards of curved electricity shot from the Tesseract at all angles, and as I fell down, most of the arcs collided where I had been standing. When I propped myself up on my elbows, the cube-house was gone, leaving only the glowing blue crystal behind.

I also saw a hand.

Then an arm.

Then a whole-ass pasty Asgardian stepped out of some weird portal, tugged me up by my shirt, grabbed the stone, and, fuck—

***

Everything was swirling and awful again.

Like synesthesia on overdrive, everything was _everything_. Sounds and colors blended together to form a cohesive and new form of sensation, my skin could taste special reasoning, individual atoms of existence overwhelmed me. I closed my eyes and held my breath but everything was such a mess, I can’t, I can’t, god it’s too much—

Solid ground was beneath my feet again. And under my hands. I was on all fours, trying not to vomit.

“ _Why_.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific, witchling.”

“ _Fuck. You._ ” I rolled over onto my back and started up at a—hmm—green sky, chest heaving. “Where the fuck are we. And why. Are we here. You goddamn bastard,” I huffed out.

“This planet was known as Ria, to its inhabitants. We’re here because the Tesseract’s version of space travel seems to make you deeply uncomfortable. Please, rest up. We’ll be moving along soon,” Loki said. He had the space stone sort of hovering above his left palm, like it was stuck in a little orb of no-touchy.

“That answers about half of my questions, which you’re smart enough to know. Spit it out, please,” I said, getting all sugary-sweet on ‘please.’ I turned to face him instead of the sickly, roiling sky. It took a second of staring, but he eventually sighed.

“I’m calling in the favor you owe me.”

“Why?”

He glared at me, so I mimicked sealing my mouth shut. “I did some…research, after leaving Midgard. You were right, about Thanos. He’s an absolute psychopath, much more so than I had originally given him credit for. That bit of information cost me the scepter, but it also confirmed that he’s collecting these infinity stones, as you called them. I intend to stop him from getting any more.”

“…May I ask how?”

“Yes, you may,” said the arrogant fucker. “You’re going to help me collect the other few floating around the galaxy, and then you’re going to desteroy them.”

“What—how? Wait, I’m confused—”

“Remember how my scepter didn’t affect you? And what you just did, on Earth. You barely grazed the Tesseract,” he motioned to the space stone floating in his hand, “and it responded by exploding out of its containment shell. If you touch a pure stone, I theorize you’ll absolutely desteroy it,” he explained. And he seemed self-satisfied with this explanation. Pompous ass.

“I feel like you skipped a few steps in the middle of that explanation.”

“I did, but it’s because we’re short on time. You do agree with my end goal, yes?”

“I mean, technically, but I don’t know if I can destroy the stones—”

“You can.”

“Okay, but if I can’t, then we’ll have collected all the stones to hand Thanos on a silver platter, which is _really super bad_. The risk just doesn’t seem worth the reward,” I said.

He squatted down to meet my eye level. I had moved off the ground, and was now sitting ass-flat on the dusty, rocky floor. “I promise you, you can destroy the stones. I told you I did research. Anomalies, like you, have existed here before, and there’s recorded events of your kind wielding immense destructive power. It’s why you can’t travel easily with the Tesseract. You force its power to shift between realities, weakening it. If you touch a pure stone for long enough, I am sure you can split it so thoroughly that it becomes next to useless,” he said.

And I wanted to believe him, I really did, especially when he looked so _sincere_ , which was unexpected for a god of lies. “Would you like a demonstration?” I nodded. “I can’t let you destroy this stone yet, as we need it to get around. But, try touching it, just for a moment.”

He moved the stone, floating in its orb, closer to me. I tentatively reached a finger out and touched it.

It wasn’t as violent as before. It didn’t explode, but a small blue shockwave did burst from the surface, and small arks of energy began to drift off like smoke. Loki pulled the stone back from me, and it stopped smoking, but the blue did seem a bit duller. I stood up. I was a bit wobbly, but my stomach felt much better.

“Do you believe me now?” Loki asked.

“You’re a known liar, so I trust you about as far as I can throw you. But. That demonstration was convincing,” I admitted.

“Help me get the next stone, fully destroy it, and then you can decide to join me or not. Hmm?”

I crossed my arms and squinted down at Loki while shifting my weight between my feet. “Just one. As a trial run.”

“Yes.”

“And I wreck the stone, and then I can decide.”

“Exactly.”

I threw my neck back and groaned while cracking my vertebrae. “If I wind up regretting this, I will find some way to fuck you up.”

“I don’t doubt it,” he was smirking now. Loki stood up, towered over me again, and held out his hand. “Ready to go?”

I shrugged. “Might as well be.”

I grabbed his hand, the space stone sparked blue, and into the hell tunnel I returned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i feel much better writing this now that I know that my plot is basically a variation of Superboy Prime's creation plot.


	10. Root: Ceanothus Americanus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy holidays y'all, here's where we start to earn the E rating.

Bracing for Tesseract Travel (patent pending) did help with the nausea, but the hell tunnel still felt like hell. The time between leaving Ria and arriving, uh, I don’t know where, felt like it took forever, but it probably lasted maybe a handful of seconds.

When we landed to wherever Loki meant for us to go, I dropped to sit on the ground instead of falling, this time. “Where are we, now?”

“A place no one was meant to find,” he said. He gave me a moment then took my hand and pulled me to my feet. “We don’t have much time. Follow me.” The place was so dark and lifeless I couldn’t see any landmarks, but Loki seemed to know where he was going as he led us around the planet’s surface.

“Does this place have a name?”

“It hasn’t for millenia.” He stopped in front of a random slab of rock. He inspected it for a second, then kicked its side, and runes sort of flickered then lit up the stone’s surface. “Hold onto me. You won’t like this next part,” Loki said. I didn’t argue and grabbed his arm just as he touched one dim rune, and the bottom dropped out from under us.

I yelped and grabbed onto him tighter. It took me a little too long to notice oh, hey, we’re not falling. It’s like a shitty high-speed elevator. I relaxed and let go of Loki. “You could have just said it’s an elevator,” I said, annoyed.

“Ah, but you’re so cute when you’re terrified and clinging onto me,” he said, flashing a smile. I grit my teeth and fought the urge to punch his pretty, perfect face. I needed him for my ride home.

The descent stopped before I could change my mind, and we stepped out onto a stone walkway. It was still nearly pitch black, but the Tesseract’s glow gave us just enough room to see where we were walking.

“What are we looking for, again?”

“Ah, yes. It’s a tall stone contraption. I need you to crawl under it.”

I stopped dead and screeched, “You brought me here because I’m _short_?”

He turned to face me and said, like it was obvious, “A job done right requires proper tools. In this case, you’re the proper tool.” He kept walking. I flipped him off from behind, then rushed to catch up.

“Fuck you.”

“Didn’t you admit last time that you want to?”

“I will steal your ankles, Loki.” He laughed at that. Not the desired reaction, but I’ll take it. “Why am I crawling into a big stone thingy, now?”

“Has your foresight told you of a substance known as the Aether?”

“Ohh, we’re by its hidey hole! Yeah, I know what it is. So this is the stone I’m supposed to somehow destroy?”

“Yes.” We rounded a corner and he pulled a telescope-looking thingy off of his belt. “Touch the Aether with this. It should contain it and allow you to interact just enough to desteroy it,” he explained. I took the tube as he handed it to me and flipped it over in my hands. “Ah! We’re here.” Fuck, finally.

I looked up and it looked like what I expected: big rock thing with a weird slit in the center, like a mail slot. “Wait, where am I crawling into?”

“Around the side, there’s a hole in the wall. It should allow you to get close enough to siphon out the Aether without triggering its defenses. The Chamber has a special link that, if opened, will alert—”

“Oh, the weird elf-dudes. Yeah, I remember ‘em. Fuck those guys.” I walked around the next turn and, as promised, sat a small hole, just big enough for me. I sighed and dropped into a squat. “I want you to know I hate this.”

“Duly noted.” I could practically hear the smirk in his voice. Motherfucker.

I tucked the tube into the back of my leggings’ waistband and got on hands and knees. It was dark in the hole, and everything felt dusty and gross, but I was about to capture an _actual infinity stone_. I pushed past my fears and moved forward, head-first into the darkness.

The tunnel kept on for a bit, bit it quickly turned, and the path began to get brighter. “Why does this hole even exist?” I called back to Loki, just as my hands got bathed in red light. I waited a second, but no response came. “Hey, Loki?” I paused and began to turn around.

“Just get the Aether, we can discuss architecture later,” he sounded exasperated. Jesus, impatient little god. I kept moving forward and the tunnel finally opened up.

It was still narrow, but now much taller, and I could access the back of the Chamber. I scooted out of the tunnel and into the small area between the Chamber’s main structure and the wall behind me that housed the tiny access tunnel. “Okay, I’m in. Extracting now,” I said. I pulled the tube from my waistband and held it up to a small gap at the back of the Chamber. I could barely see the Aether inside, but the red glow was getting stronger, so I could assume the tube was pulling it in. “C’mon, little buddy, come to mama,” I mumbled, shaking the tube a little. The red glow continued to get brighter, and brighter, and I had to squint my eyes now.

Pain shot through my arm like a bolt.

I screamed and collapsed, holding my wrist to my chest, tube forgotten on the ground. I heaved in breath just to scream again. I could barely see through the tears flooding my eyes, but my arm was _red_. Blistery, angry _red_. “Loki, Loki—something—” I choked out between cries of pain, but fuck, everything hurt so bad. I finally blinked the water from my eyes to see my hand—

It was mangled, fingers to elbow, red veins curling up from the bloody flesh—

It was like my skin had been cooked off, leaving onto black flecks of seared tissue behind, scar tissue bubbling off like steam before it could form. God, fuck, I could see my bones—in my fingers and forearm—and blood was dripping all over the place, just as red as everything else. All I could smell was cooking meat. At the realization it was my own, my vision went spotty, black at the edges. My arm—my arm—fuck, I’m—


	11. Prelude

Loki picked up the now-unconscious girl, careful of her injury. He supported her back with one arm, her knees with the other, and held the space stone between her torso and her sad excuse of a right arm.

He prepared his destination in mind and focused it toward the Tesseract, but the Aether seemed to be interfering with his connection. He readjusted his grip and, just for a second, the space stone’s aura grazed the witchling’s arm—

“ _Shit_ —”

A flash of blue, and the pair disappeared.

***

“…She just, showed up—”

“How? …”

“Loki, he…brought her…”

“…! She’s awake!”

***

_How could someone with so much Earth-shattering information barely reach the cabinets?_

_Tony could admit he wasn’t the tallest man in the Avengers, although he would prefer to blame that fact on his coworkers being gods and surgically enhanced super soldiers, but_ damn _was Venus small._

_“Don’t make fun of me! Just hand me the bowl, please?” she said._

***

“You said she had a heart defect? Did she mention the condition by name?”

“No, and, fuck, what does her heart have to do with this? Can you save her arm, or not?”

“Mr. Stark, please—”

“Tony, calm down—”

“Everyone, out!”

Tony stood, huffing in the hospital room, alone except for the unconscious girl on the respirator next to him.

***

_Tony sighed and grabbed the bowl in question. “What are you cooking, anyway?”_

_“Brownies, which you only get to have if you play nice,” she said matter-of-factly while cutting open the boxed brownie mix._

_“I got you the bowl, didn’t I?”_

_“Only after you acted all huffy when I tried to get it myself.”_

_“You were climbing up the counter! Why didn’t you ask for help earlier?”_

***

“Bruce!”

Bruce pushed his shoulder back and took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. This was no place to hulk out. He waved off a concerned Steve. “It’s fine, I’m fine. Loki, explain again what happened.”

The god twirled a pen around his finger in the office chair in front of him. “It’s exactly as I’ve said before, my explanation won’t change no matter how many times you lot have me repeat it.” His usually cocky attitude seems subdued, at least. Perhaps the man wasn’t a total sociopath. “I took her with me to help in retrieving another infinity stone—”

“Why did you take _her_? Why not one of us, why not _me_?” Thor said. His knuckles were white with his grip on his own forearms, likewise trying not to get enraged at the circumstances. “Why did you take a _child_ somewhere so dangerous?”

Loki’s eyes snapped up from the pen, and he glared at his brother. “I doubt she would appreciate you infantilizing her. And _I brought her because I doubt any of you would have been willing to help_ ,” he snapped.

Thor deflated, and Bruce went to check Venus’s condition again.

***

_“You’re always busy, and I didn’t want to bug you!” Tony rolled his eyes and awkwardly lifted hs hand then dropped it again. It would be weird if he ruffled her hair, right? She’s not a dog. Or his kid, although she now had his last name. Turns out it’s easier to hide a trans-dimensional mis-adventurer when you pretend she’s adopted._

_“Next time, just come get me. Or Pepper. Or anyone over 5’5, really.” That earned him a sharp glare. “How tall are your parents, anyway?”_

_“My dad’s 6’2—”_

_“Bullshit. Your mom has to be like 3-foot-nothing, then.”_

_“Nope. She’s average height for an American woman. I’m what you would call,” she spun around on her heel with a little flourish, “stunted. Oh, and while we’re dropping that small info-bomb, my actual last name is also Starke.”_

_“Bullshit—"_

***

Loki glared at the man blocking his path. “Do you need something?” he hissed.

“You’re not coming in.”

“Stark, I know you’re not her real father. There’s no need for you to pretend to be so protective,” Loki said, pushing past Venus’s guardian. A surprisingly strong grip on his arm paused him mid-stride.

“Get. The fuck. Out,” Stark practically growled.

“Why should I?” he mocked. He flashed that particular grin all the mighty-warriors-in-dress-up seemed to hate. Before he could blink, a scared fist made itself acquainted with his eye—

***

_“I’m kind of a medical oddity, I guess.” Thor glanced up in time to see the girl shrug._

_“How so?” He had little reference for Midguardian medicines, typical and odd alike. Nevertheless, he was quite curious._

_“Like, I was born not breathing. Then I had a heart defect. Then my ADHD meds messed with my body so much that I malnourished myself. Oh, and I’ve never broken a bone, but I did fall out of a moving golfcart.”_

_Oh. Well. “I suppose that is odd, no matter one’s species,” he said. She nodded, and the two sat in silence for a moment._

_“Venus, what is a golf cart?”_

***

“Thor, you need to bring her to Asgard. Your healers may be able to extract the Aether from her—”

“I’m sorry, and the Aether is what caused the damage to her arm?” Steve felt bad for interrupting, but he also hated playing with a half-full deck. The whole Bucky situation had him preoccupied, so he was coming into this situation with less than an ideal amount of intel.

The Sorceress Supreme nodded, evidently not too angry about Steve’s interruption. “Yes. It’s an infinity stone, as Loki said, but it’s the most parasitic of the lot. If it isn’t removed from her, Venus may never wake up,” she explained.

“Thor, take her to Asgard. Now.” Tony piped up from the back, bags under his eyes getting darker by the hour. How attached had that megalomaniac gotten to Venus in the five weeks he’d been gone? “She’s been in a coma for a week. She’s—” he stopped, dropped his head, then sighed and straightened his spine. “She’s tough, we know that, but we know next to nothing of her medical history. We don’t know how this thing’s interacting with her insides, we don’t know what damage it’s already done. I know your dad hates her, but try to reason with the man.” He paused, and it felt like the room held its breath. “Please?”

Steve had, of this moment, officially seen everything.

***

_“You know I’m not a good person to talk to about periods, right?”_

_“Um. Yes? I mean, is that why you thought I wanted to talk to you?”_

_Nat shrugged. “Why else?” She wasn’t exactly friendly with the kid. Venus had managed to get enough of the team acting as her stand-in daddies, and she didn’t need a mommy, too. Natasha had better things to do with her time. And, if the kid really wanted a family, she should’ve gone home with Clint._

_“I want help, uh, training. Like, being stronger._

_Natasha looked Venus up and down, quickly estimating her. “Okay…but, again, why me? Why not ask Tony, I get why not Bruce, but you’ve even got Thor nearly wrapped around your finger.”_

_“Wait, what? I do?” Was this kid dumb? “Anyway—I want your help because you’re most likely to have the expertise I need. You started training and stuff when you were a kid, which means you trained while being a small female, at some point. I am a small female. Tony and Thor’s fighting styles probably won’t work for me, but you may know a style that does,” she explained. Okay, not dumb. At east, not intellectually dumb._

_Natasha sighed internally. Was she really going to do this? To put another thing on her plate? She looked Venus over again: short, soft, no muscle definition whatsoever. But, determination behind the eyes. And logic enough to know that her new life wasn’t free of dangers, despite the cushy penthouse._

_“Okay, kid. Show me what you got.”_

***

I woke up to the sound of beeping. Really, really annoying beeping.

I extended my arm off to shut the alarm up, but fuck—that hurt—

I opened my eyes.

White walls, white ceiling, white sheets on a while bed. I’m in a hospital again.

I looked down and saw my arm in a sling, and everything came rushing back:

The planet, the stone, the pain, the _pain_ , oh _my god, it hurts_ —

“She’s awake!”

My brain stopped mid-spiral as someone’s arms wrapped around me. One remaining good arm grabbed the back of his shirt, and I started to cry.


	12. Interim

The days after I woke up went by in a blur. My arm started healing faster, and I talked Tony and Thor out of sending me to Asgard until I could hold my own (verbally, dear god not physically) against Odin. After I could stay awake for most of a day without passing out, the Ancient One swung by. I don’t know if I can claim she was checking in on me, but I’d like to believe so, because that’s cute.

The pleasantries, as per usual with most people I now commonly interact with, were just about skipped.

“If you feel strong enough, I would like to check your condition, beyond what the doctors here can do. Preferably, this would be done by healers on Asgard, but I can manage a cursory check until you feel comfortable traveling to that realm. Do you mind?” she said.

“Thank you for asking.” I fidgeted a bit with the pillow behind me. Sitting up, even with all the pain meds, made me feel all achey. “I think I’m up for it. Are you doing the astral projection thing again?”

“In a way. I will pull your astral form out, and my own form can partially enter your body to see where the Aether has congregated. It should tell us some of the impact it’s having on you, and perhaps explain the damage to your arm,” she said. It was also weird to see her, all decked out in robes, in a shitty bedside chair. It was like cognitive dissonance made visual.

“Oh, yeah. When Jane got the Aether, it didn’t blast her arm apart. And y’all said my arm wasn’t really healing until I woke up?”

“Ahh, so Jane Foster was meant to host the Aether,” she trailed off, her eyes losing focus for a moment. “Anyhow,” she refocused on me, “yes, your arm remained in a state of essentially eternally burning until you awoke. If you had slept much longer, your arm may have had to have been amputated. It’s a strange reaction, as the Aether usually prefers to keep its hosts in pristine condition so it can feed off their life force for the longest possible time. The questions your condition raise are another reason to check your corporeal form from the astral plane.” I nodded.

“Okay, so, what do I do? Sit back, rela—”

She tapped my forehead, and I was thrown out again. Fuck, I hate when she does that.

The Ancient One was sticking her non-physical hand through my body by the time I caught my bearings. I did my best to sit back and wait for her to finish when a flash of red caught my eye. I glanced to the side, and yelped, because, fuck, my arm was _on fire again_.

I started waving around, then stopped, just as the Ancient One turned to see what was happening.

My arm wasn’t on fire, it was just glowing red. Veins of red lightening arced up then back into my arm, lacing a pattern up through my shoulder. And, in this form, it didn’t hurt. It was just oddly warm, and pulsed, like a second heartbeat.

I blinked, and I was back in my body.

The Ancient One and I stared at each other. The moment dragged on, then she blinked and nodded, and disappeared through a golden spiral.

***

That interaction put a halt to any plans to send me to Asgard, for now. And by the end of the week I was carted back to Stark Tower.

By the following week, I was up and around again, my arm about as healed as it would get. I still had it in a sling, but the skin had mostly scarred over by that point. There were still lots of red striations that glowed just beneath the skin, striations that crept up past the injury and into my shoulder, like the red in my astral form. No one knew what to make of it, so none of us said anything at all.

Except, there was one voice/indignant huff that was notably absent from this collective silence: Loki.

I didn’t see him while I was in the hospital, and I didn’t see him when I got home. Which sucked, because I wanted to thank him for bringing me back to Earth. He’s an asshole for causing the damn mess in the first place, but hey, at least he tried to clean up his mess this time. And it’s good to reinforce desired behavior, so I wanted to see him.

Because my life is never easy, I didn’t see Loki until I sought him out.

Thor, bless his heart, was still moving between Midgard and Asgard. Just in case, he was still lobbying for me to see Asgard’s healers. Also, he was trying to coordinate his brother’s non-arrest. In all realities, it seems, Thor has a big ass soft spot for his brother. Technically Loki didn’t commit genocide this time, so Thor had a leg to stand on in his defense. Loki only murdered like, one guy. And some agents. It’s fine, don’t question it.

Anyway, Thor’s Hermes-esque status meant I could find him and use him to get to Loki. Easy-peasy.

***

“Please? Pretty please?”

“He nearly got you killed!” Hmm. Okay, so not quite easy-peasy.

“Okay, yeah, but he also brought me back after he fucked up. It’s good to reinforce desired behavior,” I said. That froze Thor’s rant, and I used the opportunity to grab his hands and look all pleading. “Please? You can stay the whole time, if you want, to keep me safe. And thank you, by the way, for being so worried. I just want to talk to him really quick, then I’ll go home. I promise.”

That cracked his resolve. The tension in his shoulders dropped, and he sighed. He dropped my hands and pulled me into a hug, which I gladly reciprocated. For anyone wondering: yes, Thor gives the best bear-hugs. He’s like a human weighted blanket, and it’s amazing. “You do not tell Stark about this. My father is already considering having my head on a platter, I do not need any more enemies right now.”

I pulled back enough to motion zipping my mouth shut.

With another sigh, Thor held up his hammer. “Heimdall, take us to Nuuk.”

“Please!” I chirped. As the rainbow light surrounded us, I could practically hear the baritone of his chuckling, and then Tony’s kitchen faded out in a sea of light.

***

Landing from space-magic travel always made me dizzy, but the Bifrost was better than the tesseract. I shook out my limbs as Thor made his way through some trees to a small cabin. We landed in a anowy forest clearing, and I was instantly freezing in my leggings and thin sweater.

I jogged to catch up with the blond. “Where are we?”

“Greenland,” he said, pushing the wooden door open with a creak.

The inside was nicer than the outside would imply: cushy carpet, seats with jewel-toned cushions, a solid wood dining table, a…throne? A throne thingy? Okay, so this was fake.

On cue, Thor made an annoyed grunt-noise. “Loki, drop the illusions, and come properly greet your guest.”

“Guest?” His voice came from around a corner. “Is it Father, here to finally end my suffering? Or perhaps one of your human friends, here to harass me over Venus again?” The voice got more distant, then closer again, and the illusionary scenery melted away. What remained made more sense: rustic furniture, a wood-burning stove, still rather nice but far more woodsy than Loki’s preferred aesthetic.

The man himself appeared a moment later. He mouth was half-cocked to say something, probably an insult, but then he saw me. I smiled that tight-lipped and awkward white people smile, then waved a bit. I could practically see his brain as it changed gears and switched tactics for the new situation. “Hey, Loki.”

“Ah. Venus.” Ooh, the gears were grinding a bit. Then his expression shifted into something charming and well-dispositioned. “I am glad to see you’re up and around.” Mission success: schmoozer-Loki engaged.

“Me too. Being bedridden isn’t fun, especially when you’re down an arm,” I said. That made his smile tighten up, just a bit.

The momentum of the conversation stalled, and our trio was left in an awkward silence. I shifted back and forth on my feet a bit, then gestured to a chair and said, “May I?” Loki nodded, and I sat in the nearest arm chair. I shook my head a bit and pulled my sleeves over my hands. “Fuck, it’s cold as balls here. And I hate awkward silences.” I met Loki’s eyes, and sighed. “I’m not going to thank you for taking me to a hospital, because that pretty much just cancels out you getting me so badly hurt in the first place. But I do appreciate it, and I will thank you for taking me home and not to Asgard. So, thanks.” Loki’s posture relaxed, and I leaned further into the chair.

“I am glad I guessed your preferences correctly,” he said. I nodded.

Before another silence could develop, Thor said, “Alright, Venus, if you’ve said when you aimed to say, then we can be on our way.” I shifted my neck to look at him and caught his partially-aborted move to gesture to the door.

I blew a lip bubble and leaned on the armrest. “But we just got here! Why are we in Greenland, anyway?”

“It’s my punishment,” Loki said, dropping into the armchair across from me. “A temporary of exile while Thor and Father decide what my permanent fate should be,” he said, tone wholly derisive.

“I mean, it’s better than prison,” I noted. “Maybe not much, but the snow’s pretty.” I stared out the window, where some fresh power just started raining down.

Loki huffed. “Pretty, yes, but not exactly entertaining. I am, as you Americans say, ‘bored out of my mind.’” I smiled and snorted. “Oh, does my pain amuse you?” he asked, putting a hand to his chest melodramatically.

“When you phrase it like that, yeah, it does,” I joked. Loki opened his mouth to retort, not mean but like for banter, but Thor cut him off before he could start.

“Venus, you promised you would not argue with me on this. We should leave, now,” he said. I rolled my eyes while he couldn’t see it, which made Loki’s lips regain the upward quirk they lost when Thor made his announcement. Then I stood up and bonked into then leaned against Thor’s side while he readied Mjolnir.

“Bye, Loki,” I said with a Vanna wave. I just saw him start to wave back when Heimdall wrapped us up in rainbow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please lmk if y'all have suggestions! if there's a scene you want to see, let me know, and I'll see if it fits w my vision (hehe, not quite a pun). 
> 
> also. i made a playlist for writing this shit. do yall like. want it?


	13. (Un)Lucky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: c*vid mentioned in chap below

Within a few days of Venus relocating back to Stark Tower, her physical state began to deteriorate. It had been a nice interlude with her healing from the Aether’s attack, but her existence was unstable by definition, and the Aether was only making that instability worse.

The Ancient One knew, as soon as she saw the girl, that she would be dead by the end of the month.

It was early July, now. She didn’t know if the girl would live to see August.

The relocation was not easy. Venus wanted to stay “home,” at the Tower, but settled for the Sanctum in lieu of Kamar-Taj. Daniel Drumm was willing to house the girl, luckily, and would look after her during any absences of the Ancient One.

This all began the long process of trying to remove the Aether without Asgard’s involvement.

Venus still refused to visit that realm, nor did she like the idea of pulling the reality stone from her body. Despite all the evidence it was killing her, she was afraid of what would happen if it was extracted. She was afraid of Thanos finding it too soon, or perhaps of losing her single bargaining chip in this world of heroes and monsters. Even the Sorceress Supreme was not omniscient; Venus’s mind was complex enough to confuse its owner and inhabitant, and was often confounding to those outside it.

The Ancient One, Drumm, and Banner thus worked in secret to extract the parasite.

And, as her body became more fragile and frail, Venus slept. And slept. And slept.

***

I am beginning to hate ceilings. All of them. Plain or painted, smooth or popcorn, all of them.

I have spent the last fourteen days, a full Covid quarantine period, staring at this damn ceiling. And I am _sick_ and _tired_ of it.

I was never much into musicals, not back before this mess and not so much even now, but I did like that one song from Heathers: Dead Girl Walking. It’s not totally applicable to me, situation-wise, but damn if title doesn’t strike a chord (ba-dum-ch). I’m dying, the sand is draining from my hourglass, and I’m left with the question of what to do until the instability in my cells makes everything lyse and give in to entropy. I could lie here, wait for Grim to find me, all that good drama. Or.

Or, I could find a god and fuck him.

My choice was an obvious one.

It hurt a little to walk now, but my arm was out of the sling, so I could power through and use walls to cope. I knew Bruce was here, studying something about my decline, and I knew he’d set up a little lab in the Sanctum basement. I also knew he took every lunch break to hang out with Natasha, and it was exactly noon as I slunk down the back staircase.

He locked the place with one of Tony’s fancy biomechanical external deadbolts, but I learned the override code from Jarvis after locking myself out of the Tower ten times, so getting in wasn’t a problem.

My path from here is relatively predictable.

Bruce had the Tesseract/Space Stone hovering in its little glass containing unit. I hit the release button, using the override code again. Alarms came to life around me, and in the glass reflection I could see someone running in after me, but blue was already swallowing me whole.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heres that playlist I promised so long ago: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2B4db8HDijEFLdCwVp4fUm?si=B_lYYoINS72s2kE2gcRptg
> 
> als, hey, kids, get BC from your gyno, if you can, because the wrong pill can give you ~anemia~ <3
> 
> yikes this chapter's short, but next time we again earn that E rating! and that should make for a longer chapter.


End file.
